Stories from a life with chronic pain.

Little By Little Is Starting To Amount To A Lot

Dear Audy,

Lifestyle changes are exhausting and wonderful!

The past week has been a strange mix of challenging, relaxing, exciting and calm. It was my birthday last week! Birthdays can sometimes be a bit of an emotional hurdle, however this year I am pleased to say the only emotions ravaging me were pleasant ones.

I decided to be lenient with my diet for my birthday. That’s what treats are there for! I had cake and gelati (not together but hmmm) and sure, I paid a bit with belly pains, but even that had the positive effect of showing me how much the diet has been helping.

I feel like I have accomplished a lot in the last twelve months. I have come a long way towards getting my body functioning around my CRPS. I have lessened my constant levels of pain, I have greatly reduced my anxiety, I have shortened my flares and I am recovering more quickly from stress and injury.

I feel like I am actually increasing my physical strength for the first time since my chronic pain began. I am walking every day and preparing three meals most days, which is a lot more activity than I used to be capable of.

My concentration has improved incredibly since I managed to (painfully) wean off the Lyrica. I am working on handling my pain and muscle stiffness using natural methods so that I can get by without the few pills that I still find myself needing. I feel confident that this task will be easier once I’m settled in my new home.

It’s all a matter of stages. Little by little I am getting better at managing the different elements that have the power to improve my quality of life when all the pieces finally fit together.

The best birthday present that I got this year was my prince home again. He has been away for over a month and life has been much more challenging without his love and support on the same side of the city as myself.

He is also very interested in trying the Paleo diet and this makes food much more exciting. I have been really great at keeping up this style of eating by myself, but I am no whiz in the kitchen. My prince is like a wonderwhiz. A grain, dairy and sugar free diet gets much more interesting with a wonderwhiz around!

Not to mention the added enticement conjured by our recent trip to the market. The prices made me feel like the supermarket has been ripping me off my whole life! It is not super at all.

I was also amazed to see many varieties of fruit and vegetables that I had never seen before. Have you ever seen a mango melon? I hadn’t, but they are big and yellow and look like a lot of fun, I am going to get one next time. My mystery fruit for this shop was an actual guava. I have no idea whether or not it will be bitter or sweet, but it’s waiting in my fruit bowl for me to find out!

We also got a selection of random green leafy things. I was so accustomed to the pitiful mainstream selection that I had no idea so many spinach-y plants existed. It was so exciting, I felt like one of those people that Jamie Oliver goes to visit because they have never seen a vegetable before.

I am actually anticipating going food shopping again, which is an experience that I have never had before in my life. I want to find out what those weird little Brussels sprout looking white balls with coloured bottoms were…because I have absolutely no clue!*

*OK, I had to look it up. I think they were Thai Eggplants, a hybrid. Although I don’t see why these should be the eggplants that need a location distinctive title, they look much more like eggs than aubergines do!

Cutting all the crap out of my diet has made me much more interesting in trying new fruits and vegetables that I was perhaps a little bit afraid of before. It’s crazy, I had trepidation about vegetables I had never seen, yet I would eat an alien concoction of sugar and chemicals in a plastic packet from the supermarket.

I acknowledge that I was ignorant, but seriously, society has a lot of ‘splaining to do.

Things that I have not been so good at lately include personal administration and social organisation. I have boring forms to fill out and boring appointments to organise and the fact that I keep referring to them as boring probably isn’t helping them to get done.

There are friends to call and family to thank and catch ups to organise. These tasks don’t come with a boring attached, they are just something that I usually need to back off from when I’m trying to make a lot of changes at home.

I have nothing planned for the week ahead other than to continue and improve. Just two words. Doesn’t sound too daunting when I think about it like that. And if I stop and look at those words again, it sounds like a whole lot to look forward to.

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7 thoughts on “Little By Little Is Starting To Amount To A Lot”

Thanks love. I always enjoy reading your blog posts… they inspire me to be more diligent with my own health improvements, and reassure me that any victory is important, even if it’s rated as a little one by the rest of the world’s standards.

Thanks Lara! I’m so glad I can help motivate people – I have been incredibly encouraged and motivated by other bloggers and authors along the way. It’s so important to count all the little steps. I am just cheering at the end of the day, even though I’m exhausted and sore and have been on the go all day to only look after myself, it’s just so wonderful to be able to do that 😀 xx

Clearly, I got a little too excited for the comment box! I meant to add in a quote from your post: “I felt like one of those people that Jamie Oliver goes to visit because they have never seen a vegetable before.”

Thank you!! Things are looking so good. My feet are arching up a bit this evening, but that just means I’ll take it easy for a few days. I’m always going to go over the limits sometimes, I figure, because otherwise I won’t know what they are! 😛 xx

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In 2006, I was diagnosed with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS), aka Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy (RSD), in my right ankle. This eventually spread to engulf my whole body, a condition known as Central Neural Sensitisation (CNS).
I've tried dozens of medications, endured hospital stays, spent years using mobility aids and been labelled incurable by doctors. They gave up on me, but I never will.
Every day, I work to retrain my brain and fight to regain function by educating myself, opening my mind to new possibilities and overcoming the challenges thrown at me.

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